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Ryan Holte

Assistant Professor of Law

Professor Holte's teaching expertise and scholarship interests include intellectual property (IP) law and property law, and he is a widely published author in IP subjects. His most recent articles focus on patent-related topics with particular focus on patent assertion entities (PAEs) or "patent trolls." For the 2013-2014 and 2014-2015 academic years, Professor Holte was awarded Thomas Edison Innovation Fellowships from the George Mason University School of Law to support research and writing on IP topics.

At the School of Law, Professor Holte teaches Property Law I & II, the Intellectual Property survey course, and Patent Law. He also serves on the Faculty IP Committee, the IP Alumni Board, and as an advisor to the SIU IP Law Society. Professor Holte speaks nationally on IP subjects and as an advisor locally in Southern Illinois to a variety of small businesses and local economic development centers regarding IP law and policy issues.

Prior to joining the SIU School of Law faculty, Professor Holte practiced as a litigation attorney at the United States Federal Trade Commission, an associate in the Intellectual Property Practice Group at the Jones Day law firm, and a patent prosecutor at the Finnegan law firm. Prior to practice, he served as a law clerk to Judge Stanley F. Birch, Jr., of the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit and as a law clerk to Judge Loren A. Smith of the United States Court of Federal Claims. Before law school, Professor Holte owned a car dealership in the San Francisco Bay Area specializing in biodiesel vehicles and worked as an engineer for Agilent Technologies/Hewlett Packard in Sonoma County, California.

Professor Holte received his JD from the University of California Davis School of Law where he served as a staff editor of the UC Davis Business Law Journal. He received his BS, magna cum laude, in engineering from the California Maritime Academy where he was a First Class graduate of the California Maritime Academy Corps of Cadets Third Engineering Division and editor of the campus newspaper,The Binnacle.

Professor Holte lives in a work-in-progress Queen Anne revival Victorian house in Marion with his wife Jessica and Great Dane Lucy.